


The Memory Eater, Time

by ncfan



Series: Valinor in the First, Second and Third Ages [3]
Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Bechdel Test Pass, Canon Relationships, Canonical Character Death, Cultural Changes, Cultural Exploration, Discussion of Culture, F/M, Gen, Grandparents & Grandchildren, Grief/Mourning, Headcanon, In some chapters, Love, Memory, Moving On, Separations, The Sun and Moon, Time - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-30
Updated: 2013-10-10
Packaged: 2017-12-28 01:31:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 16,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/986051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ncfan/pseuds/ncfan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is how she will best remember him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. I.

**I.**

This is the moment of Findaráto that she will always remember best—the bright, shining expression he wears as they exchange their rings, their vows. The light of Malinalda herself would have to pale in comparison to the face of joy he shows to her. Amarië can see naught of her own face but what is reflected in his eyes, but she does not need to have her face reflected to her to know that she is radiant too.

Amarië came from her mountain city of Taniquetil, that which the Noldor and Teleri often call Oiolossë, to serve as a lady-in-waiting to the Vanyarin Queen of the Noldor, when Findaráto was still naught but a small boy. She had known him, of course, watched him grow, but the Queen's grandson and her lady-in-waiting had very little to do with one another. When Elenwë wed Turukáno, she looked at her former fellow ladies-in-waiting and joked that if they lingered long enough in Tirion upon Túna, they'd find their husband here too. Elenwë is not supposed to be possessed of even an ounce of her mother's foresight, but perhaps she has more insight into the future than anyone can guess.

" _Oh, excuse me!"_

_Amarië turns a corner in the palace and nearly runs headlong into someone coming from the opposite direction. In the process, she also loses her grip on the sewing basket she was bringing to Indis, and watches despairingly as it slides out of her hands._

_Indis is not a particularly harsh or exacting mistress. If anything, she is far more kindly and lenient than Amarië had expected a Queen to be. In all the time that she has served her, Amarië has not once heard Indis raise her voice at anyone. Not her servants, not her husband, not her children, children by marriage, step-son, his children, or her grandchildren. Her quiet demeanor is rather unlike what Amarië had expected from the Queen of the Noldor._

_If Amarië is a few minutes late for having to replace every spilled needle, spool of thread and other bits and pieces back into the sewing basket, Indis will not be angry with her. Amarië can just imagine what she will say—"These things happen, dear; just bring the basket over here and we will set it to rights", or something like that. But that almost makes it worse. Indis's constant lack of anger at mistakes made by those around her makes taking advantage of her gentle nature feel utterly crude. Amarië always feels a spike of guilt to hear that accepting voice and see that understanding face, even if Indis's intent is not to inspire guilt, so…_

_So Amarië can't help but breathe a sigh of relief when the one she ran into reaches out and catches the basket before it can hit the ground and fall open._

" _My apologies. I was not watching my step, I find."_

_Amarië looks up at the speaker and recognizes him almost immediately—Findaráto Ingoldo, the eldest of her mistress's grandchildren by her youngest child, Arafinwë. He smiles at her, a mixture of friendly and rueful, and though he has been a grown nér for many years, the expression puts Amarië in mind of a child standing on the cusp of adulthood._

_Findaráto holds out the wicker sewing basket to her. Amarië accepts it with a wide smile of her own, grateful to be spared embarrassment, and drops in a brief curtsey. "Thank you, Highness!" she breathes, smile widening further._

_Amarië will never be sure what did it—the sight of her smile, the sound of her voice, the way her skirt rustled when she bent in a curtsey. Findaráto blinks, and stares at her, and it's not a threatening look, but it's not the sort of look a child would give her, either. He doesn't looks like some child-adult anymore. He drinks in the sight of the shawl draped over her head and shoulders, obscuring her wheat-colored hair, takes in the sight of her sleeveless dress. "Ah!" he says brightly. "You're one of my grandmother's ladies, are you not? And your name, it was… No, don't tell me! Lady Amarië, is that your name?"_

_She bites back a laugh at his eager face. "Yes, Highness. I am she."_

Findaráto began seeking out his grandmother's company far more often than he used to. Fëanáro had already been exiled to Formenos by this time, his father and sons gone with him. Though her eldest daughter was often with her, Indis was lonely and stung by Finwë's departure, his support of the son who had threatened to slay his brother, Indis's child Nolofinwë. Findaráto's company was welcome. That he, over time, seemed apparently more interested in the company of one of her ladies-in-waiting did not grieve Indis over-much. _"Love is the well-spring of joy,"_ she had said, perhaps a touch wistfully.

Aye, love does indeed seem to be the well-spring of joy, for Amarië suspects her heart will burst from it ere long.

Their families watch them from either side as they exchange their rings, exchange vows of betrothal, as Amarië's mother and Findaráto's father step forward to do their parts in the ceremony. It had taken weeks for Amarië's letter to reach Taniquetil and for her parents, younger sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces and nephews to take the winding road down off of the mountain and come to Tirion to bear witness to Amarië's betrothal. The same, it had taken long indeed for Findaráto's Telerin kin to come from Alqualondë, and for those residing in Formenos who were both permitted and willing to attend to return from the grim fortress town.

It can be said, though, that all is not entirely well.

None of Amarië's grandparents, either maternal or paternal, would leave the mountain. They wished not the leave behind them the strongest rays of the Two Trees, and Amarië's paternal grandparents were not entirely approving of her marrying a Noldo, not even one supposed to resemble a Vanya in form.

Finwë's absence is impossible not to notice; it bleeds like a gaping wound, noxious and infecting. Up from Formenos, Maitimo, Makalaurë with his wife and Curufinwë with his wife and tiny son say that the King their grandfather is well. The King their grandfather is overjoyed for his grandson and expresses his hope that Findaráto and his betrothed will visit him soon. Indis's lips thin noticeably at the news that Finwë will not come himself, torn between displeasure and grief.

Findaráto's maternal grandparents are also absent, giving their apologizes and saying that their duties do not allow them to leave Alqualondë. The rest of his maternal kin are here, though, and really, that's not what gives the spring air a sudden chill. If disapproval from her own family and the feuds and rivalries dividing Findaráto's was all Amarië had to contend with, she would still be able to exchange rings with her beloved without a care in the world.

They are not entirely sure how long they wish the period of their betrothal to last. Amarië knows that it will last at least a year, as is customary amongst the Calaquendi. Findaráto wants to wait two, maybe three years, but Amarië expressed the desire to get married right away once the betrothal period has passed, and is still surprised at herself and her uncharacteristic lack of caution. She finds that she is impatient, wants to wed right away, call Findaráto her husband and hear him call her 'wife.'

In one, two, maybe three or more years, there will be another ceremony like this one. It will be larger, most likely, attended by the entire extended family that can come. There will be more words exchanged, more vows made. A wedding ceremony, that this betrothal ceremony is but a prelude to.

But where is she going, and what is it that awaits her?

It has been many years since she last set foot in Taniquetil. Amarië's youngest sister, Elvëandil, who was just a small girl when Amarië went to serve Indis in Tirion, is grown now, married with children of her own. Amarië remembers how she felt when she first came to live in Tirion. The air down off of the mountain was so thick; it was like breathing soup, and just as pleasant. Amarië missed the sounds of bells and constant music and song, and found the clanging of hammer against metal in the many forges to be no comparison. The people were overly somber and serious, and oftentimes quite unfriendly or at least brusque around strangers, at least by Amarië's standards. And the way they looked at her when they would see her in the streets…

Untold years it took for Amarië to feel truly comfortable in Tirion, and often does she still find herself staring out of windows facing northwest, towards her mountain city. She still misses Taniquetil, for all that Tirion has been her home for decades now. In one, two, maybe three or more years time when she and Findaráto wed, Amarië will no longer be a Vanya. She will be the Vanyarin wife of a Noldorin prince. She will be expected to dwell with her husband, to go where he goes, and to never go somewhere without him without permission. Amarië does not consider this a great and terrible loss. It is not a loss if she is marrying one whom she loves and expresses interest in her people and her culture, but she will not have much opportunity to go home once she is wed.

And what sort of life will she have here, as the Vanyarin wife of a Noldorin prince?

Amarië has had ample opportunity to see what the people think of Indis. It came as no surprise to her that the followers of Fëanáro bore no love for Finwë's second wife, but when she came here, it still shocked her, just a little bit, to see that even amongst those who did _not_ call themselves followers of the son of the Þerindë, there was precious little love felt for the Queen.

She is too foreign. Everything about her screams foreign, from her pale hair to her facial structure to the way she never seems entirely comfortable in Noldorin-style clothing, serves to remind the Noldor, over and over again, that Indis is not one of them. And they do not wish to consider her one of them. She is foreign, and therefore suspect. The Noldor and the Vanyar may once have dwelled together, but their paths have diverged, and are strange to one another—and if Amarië is honest, she is not sure how well-accepted Noldor living in Taniquetil are. Indis's demeanor, her behavior, hr very spirit, they are not correct, so she is not correct, and she is not accepted.

Elenwë has had better luck, and if she is not loved by the Noldor of Tirion, she is at least tolerated, and even liked by some. Amarië's former fellow lady-in-waiting has imparted words of wisdom upon her, in the hopes that Amarië will not suffer the scorn and disapproval of the Noldor as Indis has.

" _You know that the Noldor are less accepting of strangers than they were. In days of old, they were more accepting of those of other different Kindreds of the Calaquendi, but that's changed. Whatever shadow falls over Aman affects this as well. But even before then, the Queen was never loved._

" _It is true that in Aman, the Calaquendi wed only once, or at least they are supposed to. In the hearts of many, Míriel Þerindë is still Queen, and Indis only a pretender to her throne, a harlot out in the open." Elenwë grimaces, at the bitter taste of calling her gentle former mistress 'harlot' for any reason, Amarië can imagine. "You know what many of our own people think of the Queen's marriage."_

_That it is no marriage at all. Amarië nods and adds her grimace to Elenwë's, and the younger nís goes on, "But do you know what I think it was? I think what truly turned so many of the Noldor against the Queen is that she did not immediately abandon all of the cultural trappings of the Vanyar._

" _Oh, I am not sure that the Queen would be any better-loved if she had immediately begun dressing, talking and acting like a Noldo; for all I know, if she had done that, they would have said that she was trying to make them what she was and despised her for that. I can only say that it worked for me." Elenwë gestures at her close-fitting, restrictive Noldorin dress for emphasis. "I do not know why that is. It could only be that it is because I wed a Noldorin_ prince, _moreover one not likely to ever be King, and that I wed a nér who was not once wed to another. But it worked for me, Amarië."_

It is unlike Elenwë to be so candid: Elenwë, who, if two people were rutting on a table in front of her, would likely only reach over them for the tea set and do her very best to ignore the moaning, face going red all the while. And Amarië suspects that Elenwë's suspicion is correct: it is not that Elenwë immediately abandoned Vanyarin dress and customs that endeared her to the Noldor, but the fact that she did not wed their King.

The people dislike Indis because of who she is, and whom she wed. How she is or isn't dressed and how she does or doesn't act, and their reaction to it, is only a symptom of their dislike, not the cause. Amarië will not abandon the ways of her people. It will make no difference.

_But can I live with that?_

_I must._

It will not be easy. Amarië knew that when Findaráto first broached the topic of marriage. He had that dreamy look on his face he often got and no idea of what it meant to her, separation from her people and the rest of her life spent in a place that is not home. In a place where she will always be a stranger, and never one of _them._ But when she said this to him, he smiled kindly, that warm, kind smile, and said " _Well they'll just have to learn to love you the way I do."_

" _I should hope you don't mean_ exactly _the way you do,"_ Amarië retorted, but his words were reassuring, and remain so.

Amarië has seen her share of marriages turned sour, of two Quendi united in love, but later torn apart. By family feuds. By arguing, by miscommunication. By irreconcilable differences, gaps that simply can not be bridged, they no longer love each other, but are bound together for all eternity, for that is the law. But Amarië can believe that the love she and her beloved share will endure. She can believe that, she does believe, she has to believe it.

Just as the golden light is twined with silver and dusk falls upon them, they exchange rings. Simple silver bands they are, without adornment. Small and light for Amarië's hand, and wider, but still light for Findaráto's.

Amarië smiles, and in a breach of protocol (but one typically overlooked, and frankly even expected) leans up for a kiss. This is how she will best remember him: adoring and adored, his mouth soft and warm against hers, her golden prince, as they exchange silent vows to never be parted, by time, or distance, or death.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Findaráto, Ingoldo—Finrod  
> Turukáno—Turgon  
> Arafinwë—Finarfin  
> Fëanáro—Fëanor  
> Nolofinwë—Fingolfin  
> Maitimo—Maedhros  
> Makalaurë—Maglor  
> Curufinwë—Curufin
> 
> Malinalda—'Tree of Gold'; a name of Laurelin, the younger of the Two Trees of Valinor; a name I envision to be one of its older titles, and thus still commonly used by the Vanyar  
> Oiolossë—'Ever-snow-white'; the most common name amongst the Eldar for the mountain (and city of the same name, in my canon) of Taniquetil; I have, however, made it a name more commonly used by the Teleri and especially the Noldor, to explain how the Elves of Middle-Earth came to call the city by the Sindarin translation of this name, 'Amon Uilos'  
> Nér—man (plural: neri)  
> Calaquendi—Elves of the light (singular: Calaquendë) (Quenya)  
> Nís—woman (plural: nissi)  
> Quendi—Elves (singular: Quendë) (Quenya)


	2. II.

**II.**

Indis is crying again.

Indis is crying again, and as she does, she attempts to hide it. She has shut and barred the door of her chambers against servants and attendants alike, against anyone who might come to visit her out of the darkness. The sound is muffled, even accounting for the barrier of the door—Indis has a handkerchief to her mouth, or perhaps one of the ends of her shawl. She has never permitted any of her servants or attendants, of which Amarië is the last one left, to see her weep. But as much as she tries, the sound of her sobs echoes through the halls and corridors of her house, eerie and forlorn.

Findis left for Tirion a few hours ago. It is impossible to really tell time in this terrible darkness, broken as it is only by the light of candles and torches, and of Isil the Sheen in the sky, but it has waned down to almost nothing again; the Quendi (not Calaquendi; Amarië can never call herself one of them, no, not after the light died) determine when to eat, sleep, and work, what little work they do, by how hungry, tired, or energetic they feel. If Amarië had to guess, though, she would say that Findis left a few hours ago. But it feels more like an eternity. All time stretches out into infinity in this darkness, when Isil the Sheen is but a curling wisp of light in the sky.

The presence of Indis's oldest child with her in Taniquetil was enough to make Indis stop crying for a while. Findis is as tall as her mother, with a face shaped much like the widow of the King's, but she has glossy black hair and coal gray eyes that leaves no doubt as to who her father is. Princess Findis is at the best of times rather inscrutable, quiet and stoic as she is, utterly unlike her siblings. Even as obviously grief-stricken as she is over the death of her father and the loss of her siblings (and it's unsettling to see any level of emotion showing so plainly on her face), she has not shed a tear. She has not shed one tear, she has not broken down weeping; she's gone about life much as she did, if with rather less vigor than before. Amarië isn't sure whether to find it inspiring or frightening.

When Findis came up from Tirion to be with her mother in Taniquetil, Indis stopped crying for a while. At first, Amarië thought that Findis's presence had given Indis heart and comfort, but now she wonders if her mistress wasn't simply choking down her tears so hat her daughter would not have to see her weep. One of Amarië's sisters, Thorondis, has before mentioned feeling as though she must always be strong in front of her children, not knowing why, only that she must. That might explain why it feels as though Findis's departure has loosed a floodgate. Of course, it could be that the news that drew the princess away has triggered the loosing of those floodgates on their own.

Amarië presses her cheek against the cool stone wall, listening to the muffled sobbing behind the door in front of her, but instead of giving her some calm as such an action might have done in the past, the chill of the stone only makes her shake and shiver. Her breath catches in her throat. Amarië doesn't wish to stand here, impotent, helpless to do anything but listen to Indis weep, but she must stay within earshot, for if Indis wishes for something, or wishes for her handmaiden's (for that is what Amarië is among the Vanyar—'handmaiden', not 'lady-in-waiting') company. Amarië must be there.

Her breath hitches in her throat once more, threatening to turn into sobs of her own. Oh, the news Findis and her mother received.

The news that has driven Findis to return to Tirion wish such haste is that Arafinwë, youngest son of the late King Finwë and his second wife Indis the Fair, has returned. After abasing himself before the Valar, he was permitted to return to Tirion with those who followed him. He proclaimed himself King in the great square of the city, without the blessing of the Valar. Findis has returned to her childhood home to give him what support she can.

When she first caught wind of what the Noldorin messenger was saying to the princess and the widow of the King, Amarië had hastened to the door of the presence chamber and listened for any word of them as though she was a child again, prone to eavesdropping and listening in on the conversations of her betters. _Oh, please. Oh, please. Please let them have returned with him._ For one moment, trapped as she was in this dark, lightless world, Amarië felt a spark of hope, and it felt as though the light of Malinalda and Silpion had been kindled once more.

But her hopes were dashed. Arafinwë returned to Tirion at the head of a host of less than one hundred Noldor, a tiny fraction of the host that first set out from the city under the Princes of the Noldor. The vast majority of the Noldor in Aman remain sundered from their kin, and at Arafinwë's side were none of his own kin. Not his children, nor his siblings, nor his niece and nephews, nor any of the kin related to him through marriage.

So Elenwë has stayed with her husband. Amarië was so shocked when Elenwë announced her attention to depart with Turukáno, and take their young daughter Itarillë with her. She and Elenwë's mother, Elenilmë, who was visiting her daughter before the darkness fell on them, pleaded with Elenwë not to go. The dangers of Endóre were too great for her and her daughter, they said. What sort of life would that be for Itarillë, as young and sweet and frail as she was? The Valar had forbidden the Quendi to leave in pursuit of the Enemy, they said. How could Elenwë leave everything she had known, and when to do so was to defy the Valar as well? How could she do that to her daughter? How could she do that to herself?

Finally, Elenilmë, who is known amongst the Vanyar to possess some small degree of foresight, declared that Elenwë would never leave to see Endóre, if she left. But even that, as horrifying as the ominous pronouncement sounded to Amarië, was not enough to sway Elenwë.

" _No, Mother. No, Amarië. My place is with my husband, and my child, wherever they may lead me. I will not leave them now. I can not."_ Her face was bloodless, her eyes filled with barely-concealed wild panic of her own choice. But she walked away from them to the departing Noldor with her head held high, without ever looking back.

_Have you and your daughter reached Endóre, my friend? Or did you perish without ever seeing those lands, as your mother foretold? I do not believe, Elenwë, that you have done the right thing. Nothing that is done with the intent to defy the Valar can ever be right. But for your sake, and Itarillë's, I pray that you have found those lands, alive and well. I pray that your daughter will thrive and live to grow into a strong, beautiful nís. I pray that you will be happy there._

_I do not think I could be._

And Findaráto has not returned either.

He tried to convince her to come with him, came to her terrified and desperate, resolute in his intention to leave, but utterly terrified of what he was leaving behind and where he was going. _"Come with me! We can be wed now, if you're worried about propriety; you'd not wanted a long engagement anyways. Please, Amarië. I can not say if we will ever return to Aman. I do not wish to be sundered from you unto the breaking of the world, and I do not believe you wish for that either! Please come with me! Amarië…"_ He had broken off then, broken down, drawing in deep, gulping breaths more than close kin to the sobs coming from Indis's chambers.

Findaráto's fear and misgivings were so palpable that Amarië could practically see them etched into his skin. Her golden prince looked wan and fearful in the torchlight, head bowed, trembling, hands on her shoulders. Gone was the easy-going, cheerful nér she knew. It was like staring into the face of a stranger, someone Amarië had never known. In his place was a desperate, terror-stricken nér despairing of what the future held for any of them and too far gone in his commitment to a course of action whose rightness he was not sure of to back out.

So much had happened, seemingly all at once. The Two Trees, Malinalda and Silpion, had been defiled, slaughtered and drained by the Enemy and the dread creature Wirilomë. Valinor was plunged into darkness. Finwë had been murdered by the Enemy, Fëanáro's Silmarils spirited away. Fëanáro and his sons swore a terrible Oath in the great square of Tirion. Now, the Princes of the Noldor planned to depart across the sea, possibly never to return. You'd be forgiven for thinking the world had gone mad. It was certainly Amarië's opinion, and seemed to be Findaráto's as well.

" _Please come with me."_

He begged her to come with him.

She refused.

" _This is madness, Findaráto! Can't you see that? Your uncle's jewels are not worth forsaking Aman. They're certainly not worth dying over! And avenging yourself on the Enemy's head will not summon your grandfather back from the Houses of the Dead!"_

Amarië had refused. She had balked, told Findaráto that she would not go anywhere with him if she had to act in defiance of the Valar to do it. She was angry, angry with him for asking her to leave behind everything she knew, amazed and angry that he could even ask that of her. But mostly, she was frightened. So, _so_ frightened.

As a child, Amarië had heard from her maternal grandparents, who had both been born on the shores of the Lake before the days of the Journey, had heard tell from them of the Avari. The Avari, from either the tribes of the Tatyar or the Nelyar (it was a point of pride amongst the Vanyar of Aman that there had been no Avari amongst the ranks of the Minyar), were those who had refused to make the Journey to Aman, see the light of the Two Trees, and accept the guidance of the Valar. They were the refusers. The Avari were those who rejected paradise, and would live in darkness evermore. The Moriquendi.

They were rooted to the land, they said. They loved the stars and the trees and the waters by which they had been born. This was their home; how could anyone ask them to leave it? Two amongst the Tatyar, Nurwë and Morwë, claimed that this was a trap, that Oromë was a creature of the Dark Hunter's and that he planned to lure them all to their deaths. Many amongst the Tatyar heeded their words. But mostly, they were just frightened, frightened of the idea of leaving what they had always known behind them. Thus came the first Sundering of the Elves.

As a child, Amarië had listened to her grandparents tell of the Avari and felt nothing but scorn for those who had refused the guidance of the Valar. Now, scorn is replaced with sympathy, even empathy. Faced with Findaráto's pleas, Amarië felt as so many of the Avari must have when asked by Oromë to leave their home by the shores of the Lake. She is rooted to the land, loves it, as blighted as it is. They are all Moriquendi now in this terrible darkness, and if she was told that there was another land waiting for her, even if it was a better one where there was no blight, Amarië is not sure if she would be able to drum up the courage to go. As much as she knows that it is meet and fitting to follow the word of the Valar, she is not sure she would be able to go.

But he went. He went, and seemed a stranger as he did so, beloved stranger, but stranger still. Amarië watched him leave in silence, wondering if she had ever seen any hint that Findaráto could be like this before, and realized that she had found none. The weeping came later. It felt like it would never stop. It only recently has.

So Amarië is left to sit and ponder in the darkness, angry at Findaráto for leaving, sorry that he went, worrying, hoping, and wondering, fearful and bewildered, at the face he showed her the night that he left. How is she to reconcile the warm, radiant Findaráto of their betrothal with the pale, terrified Findaráto who left with his family to go across the sea? Two different people they seem, and seeing that fearful face of his leaves Amarië questioning what she knew of him from before. Her silver betrothal ring feels cold and heavy on her hand.

The incense is burning low.

That thought draws Amarië out of the weary track of her memories, for however little time it might. The pot of incense on the low table in front of the window is burning low. Like most Vanyar, Indis burns incense in her home; the type she prefers includes a mixture of clove, cinnamon, juniper and frankincense, combined to make quite a heady scent indeed. Amarië knows that Indis would not want for it burn down completely, so she goes to replenish the incense and reignite the flame.

The thin curling wisp of Isil the Sheen gleams faintly in the sky of the westward facing window; it has nearly set, once again. That has been the one bright spot in this terrible time, the last flower of Silpion, giving its light to a vessel wheeled through the sky by the Maia Tilion. But even this is marred. There is no constant light. Isil the Sheen waxes to fullness and wanes down to nothing—this is the closest the Quendi come to having a way to tell the time—and every time it wanes, Amarië fears that this time the power of the Valar will fail and Isil the Sheen will blink out of existence.

But there is perhaps a single wisp of hope, still.

Amarië stares at the wisp of Isil, and wonders if Findaráto can see it. She wonders if he is alive to see it, and if he is, what he thinks of it. If he sees it as a sign of hope, as she does, if he can muster any hope. Then, she thinks of herself.

There are no words for 'widow' and 'widower' in Quenya. Those terms signifying these words are in fact loanwords Common Eldarin, the language spoken by the Amanyar before they left the Lake and were sundered from the Avari and the others who were lost in Endóre. Amarië winces at the faint, muffled sobs echoing in the halls. Indis is a widow, as strange an appellation that still is for the Quendi (But one Amarië suspects will become more common as time wears on). And what will Amarië be? Will she be a widow without ever having been a bride? Without having ever known her husband in love, bodies twisted together like threads weaved in a tapestry? And what then?

Amarië goes down on her knees in front of the window, clasping her hands together and holding them up to her mouth. The silver of her betrothal ring is ice-cold on her lips.

"Elentári, Kementári. Queens of stars and earth, hear me. Lady of Mercy, hear me, please. Oh their behalf… On _his_ behalf…"

Behind her, Indis's muffled sobs echo like the keening of a ghost in the silent, gloomy corridors of her house.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Itarillë—Idril  
> Wirilomë—Ungoliant; a Vanyarin Quenya word meaning 'Gloomweaver'; the spelling in modern Quenya would be Virilomë
> 
> Isil the Sheen—the name given to the Moon by the Vanyar, eventually adopted by the Noldor and the Teleri as well as 'Isil'  
> Silpion—'Shining Lights'; a name of Telperion, the elder of the Two Trees of Valinor; a name I envision to be one of its older titles, and thus still commonly used by the Valar  
> Moriquendi—Elves of darkness (singular: Moriquendë) (Quenya)  
> Amanyar—"Those of Aman"; another name for the Calaquendi (Quenya)  
> Elentári—'Star-queen'; an epithet of Varda  
> Kementári—'Queen of the Earth'; an epithet of Yavanna  
> Lady of Mercy—an epithet of Nienna


	3. III.

**III.**

There are some who believe that fire has a soul. Perhaps somewhat tangentially, Amarië supposes that that may supply an explanation for why Míriel Þerindë named her son as she did, but that's probably not the point.

There are those who believe that fire has a soul, a fëa. Those who disbelieve in this theory say that to suppose that an inanimate force has a soul is blasphemy against Ilúvatar. They also point out a troubling question that becomes obvious when even an ounce of thought is put into the theory. If fire has a soul, then what does a Quendë do when they snuff out a candle or put out a campfire? If fire is supposed to have a soul, then is it murder to snuff out a candle?

Personally, Amarië has never seriously entertained the thought that perhaps fire has a soul. Part of that is that she does not wish to believe that she is committing murder every time she snuffs out a candle. The other part of it, though, is that she has never seen any sign of sentience in a candle flame. It seems to her that with a soul comes sentience. Quendi have fëar, and they can speak, and reason. The Eagles of Manwë have fëar, and they can speak and reason, though they do far less for the former than do the Quendi. On the other hand, however dear they may be to Kementári, flowers and trees do not speak. They do not reason. Amarië has heard tales of strange tree-like creatures in Endóre that can speak and converse with others, but these are not trees, and it seems to Amarië that real plants do not have fëar.

If a plant does not have a soul, then how can fire? How can anything that a Quendë can kindle with such ease and destroy with equal ease have a soul? Amarië sits at the table, head pillowed on her crossed arms, staring at the flickering candle on the tabletop, wondering. If she stares into it long enough, will she see some hint of a spirit there? Some fiery eye staring back at her?

"Amarië? Amarië?"

Indis has to lean over and shake her shoulder before Amarië is drawn from her thoughts. Isil the Sheen has set again, and the servants have lit all the candles, torches and lanterns in the house in order to provide enough light to move around without fear of walking into the furniture. The stars, unfortunately, even the brightest of them, do not give off enough light to do the same. Indis's face is cast in shadow as she rouses her handmaiden from winding thoughts.

Amarië's face flushes red under her mistress's scrutiny. "Ah, forgive me, Highness. I drifted off," she stammers. She blinks her eyes and sees an imprint of the candle flame beneath her eyelids.

Indis shakes her head, and the familiar forgiving look that comes over her face makes Amarië's flush darken. "It's alright, Amarië. I find that I also have difficulty keeping any concentration, from time to time. Here; I just wished for your opinion on this piece here."

A length of embroidered cloth is pressed into Amarië's hands. This is what fills Indis's time now: embroidery, sewing, weaving. She devotes herself to the task with an almost feverish passion, though one could only take it for passion by the fact that it is all that occupies Indis's waking hours. The King Indis's brother came to visit his sister recently; he took one look at Indis's sitting room, loaded down with cloth, and asked, amazed, if she was to take up occupation as a seamstress or a weaver.

But truth be told, Indis is not much of a seamstress, or a weaver, or a broideress. It's another point of embarrassment for Amarië that when she holds up her work against her mistress's, the difference in quality is immediately apparent, and it doesn't favor Indis. The most sewing Indis ever did was repairing her husband's clothes, or her children's when they were still small (From what Amarië understands, Fëanáro would not let Indis touch his clothes). What she weaves falls apart all too soon. Her stitching is loose. When she embroiders, she can not do so in a straight line, nor manage the shapes she endeavored to produce.

Still, it is at least something to draw Indis's attention away from her grief. She no longer weeps constantly; instead, Amarië catches sight only of the occasional silent tracks of tears sliding down her mistress's cheeks. An improvement, perhaps, a sign of Indis finally moving away from the most intense outpouring of grief, towards acceptance. _But how long will this last, I wonder._

Amarië looks over the cloth. It is a length of sheer purple linen, and Amarië realizes that it is meant to be a nís's shawl or scarf; the oblong cut and length of it certain suggests that. She holds it up to the light (what light there is; perhaps _that_ is having a negative effect on Indis's sewing as well) and examines the embroidery, more of Indis's work.

The gold thread is very pretty, Amarië will give her that. But the rest… It looks as though Indis was going for some sort of floral design, or perhaps leaves; however, for the most part, the design is unintelligible. _This sort of thing is best learned young, really. Then again, Highness awoke by the shores of the Lake, so I suppose she had more pressing matters to worry about than whether or not she could embroider a shawl. But then, Þerindë awoke by the Lake as well, and they still speak of her skill with the needle to this day._

"It's very nice, Highness," Amarië says at last, forcing a smile as she hands the shawl (or scarf) back to Indis. Regardless of what her personal opinions are, it's not her place to criticize her mistress's work, given that Indis did not specifically ask for an honest assessment.

Indis holds the cloth in her lap, silent. The candlelight catches in her pale gold hair, seeming to set it alight at the ends. Her hands fist in the purple cloth. "No, it's not," she remarks in that too-casual, too-cheerful voice she adopted after Finwë went in exile to Formenos with Fëanáro, to hide when she's upset. "It isn't nice at all. I could never sew, Amarië, no matter how hard I tried. My hands are too clumsy for such a delicate instrument as a needle." She picks up a needle, holds it so it catches the candlelight, then sets it back down on the table, more gently than Amarië thought she would, but then, Indis has never been one to slam objects down on tables. "I had meant it as a gift for…" she breaks off, swallowing hard. "But it's horrible to even think of giving it to her, and I don't even know where she _is…_ "

Amarië looks away, squirming uncomfortably in her chair. This is much too personal for her liking, far too close and far too real. It may be one of the duties of a handmaiden to be confidante and sympathetic ear when her mistress can be honest with no one else, but Amarië has never liked being the subject of confidences. Besides, in the past Indis so rarely spoke of her personal troubles with anyone, let alone Amarië. Her problems were her own business, she seemed to think, and would not confide in others. It also puts her into mind of a stranger visitor Indis received not too long ago, staying only for a short time.

_There comes a knocking on the door, and when it becomes clear that none of the servants are in earshot to hear it, Amarië goes to answer it. This could be the King coming to call again, or the Queen or the High Prince or one of the Princesses. It does not do to keep them waiting._

_Amarië opens the door to see a slight-shouldered stranger standing on the porch, swathed in a deep purplish-blue traveling cloak. The stranger throws back their hood to reveal a nís with dull silver hair and piercing dark eyes._

" _I have come to see the Lady Indis, your mistress," the nís says. She speaks using a dialect of Quenya Amarië has not heard spoken among any but the Vanyar in decades. Startling, considering that this one is rather clearly not a Vanya._

_Something about the nís, the way she stares directly into Amarië's eyes, the way she tilts her chin upwards, the way she carries herself, tells Amarië that this is someone she'd best listen to, that this is someone used to directing others. No question of threat passes Amarië's mind. Even with the massacre at Alqualondë, the Noldorin Exiles falling upon the Swan-Elves, all too fresh in the collective memory of the Quendi, the idea of this stranger falling upon Indis in violence is so remote in Amarië's mind as to be laughable._

_All the same, there is something else about the stranger, a familiarity that Amarië finds unsettling. She feels as though she ought to know her, almost as though she's seen her before. Amarië tells herself that the feeling is probably the symptom of the darkness, and shakes it off._

_Amarië stops at the door to the sitting room, shut as it is, and knocks tentatively. "Highness?" she calls. "You have a visitor."_

" _Who is it, Amarië?"_

_Amarië looks to the stranger, who only shakes her head, arms folded across her chest. She wears an oddly stoic expression, a touch strained about the brow and mouth. "She will not say, Highness."_

_After a long moment's pause, in which Amarië can practically see a weary look coming over Indis's face, she responds, "Send her in."_

_The stranger steps forward, gently pressing open the sitting room door. A look of trepidation flits over her skin and is quelled. She sweeps into the sitting room without so much as a greeting or a curtsey. "Well, hello Indis," she greets her host, who goes deathly pale at the sight of her, swaying slightly on the spot where she stands._

_Indis shakes, looking for all the world as though she might fall to the floor in a faint; Amarië rushes to her side, wondering, bewildered, who this nís possibly could be to have such an effect on her. "But… How can you be here?" she stammers, barely seeming to notice Amarië at her side, clutching at her arm. "You…" The pallor of ancient grief bleeds the skin around her lips and eyes. "…You were_ dead _."_

Dead? _Amarië stares, thunderstruck, at the stranger._ Then she must be…

_Amarië is drawn abruptly away from her thoughts by Indis suddenly stumbling backwards. "Highness!" she exclaims. Indis falls back into a chair as the stranger watches on sadly. Amarië is knocked to the marble floor, and finds herself nursing a bruised knee._

" _Some wraith sent by the Enemy, then?" Indis asks dully. "Sent out in this second darkness to lure me to my death, as so many others were lured?"_

" _No, silly," the other responds, stepping forward and pressing her hand against Indis's cheek. "I am quite alive. And quite real. Míriel Þerindë, returned from the Houses of the Dead."_

_Þerindë smiles gently at Indis and, slowly, tremulously, Indis smiles back._

A strange visitor indeed.

"It's funny." Indis skates her fingertips over the linen with one hand; the other lies limp at her side. "The King, my husband, always had me do the mending for his clothes even thought he knew I could barely sew. After being married to Míriel he had to know what a proper stitch looked like. He could have sent them off to a seamstress. But still…" Her face is drained and stretched, her eyes over-bright.

Amarië wishes, not for the first time, that Indis would accept her brother the King's invitation to court. Though the royal court is not as merry as it once was, Ingwë keeps spirits up as best he can, and Indis might benefit from a visit there. But then, Amarië does not remember Indis as ever being truly comfortable amongst the royal court of the Noldor, and while the circumstances are different, the same may well be said for the royal court of the Vanyar. Amarië has been sent by Indis on errands to the royal court often enough to hear their whispers: the King's sister has returned strange and foreign, speaking strangely, too Noldorin for their tastes. _Never to be accepted anywhere, it seems._

And would she really fit in there, besides? Amarië has thrown off her black and gray mourning clothes. Indis has not. She clothes herself still in gray, forsaking all adornment asides from the shawl draped about her shoulders. She would stand out like a sore thumb. _And when was she ever happy when placed under scrutiny…_

"Were you thinking of him?"

Indis's face has morphed into a sketch of weary gentleness, a vague, tired smile playing about her lips. "Were you thinking of him, when you were staring into that candle earlier?"

Findaráto? Amarië stares at her, mouth slightly open. "Ah, yes and no, Highness."

She was not thinking about Findaráto, exactly. She was thinking of a conversation they had once had. Findaráto no more believed that fire had a soul than Amarië did, but they certainly had a time speculating on what it would be like if little candle flames had souls, probably gotten more enjoyment out of it than they ought to have. How did they see, and hear, and taste and touch and smell? How would they speak, for flames had no mouths, even if many believed that they had tongues?

Indis sighs and tilts her head upwards, staring towards the ceiling. "If… If Finwë had not been killed, and the Enemy had not taken Fëanáro's Silmarils, you and Findaráto would have been wd by now. I would call you granddaughter. Do you think you would still call me 'Highness'?"

Before Amarië can summon up an answer to that question, there comes a hurried knocking on the sitting room door. At Indis's call for the knocker to come in, a messenger bursts through the door, panting hard. "H-Highness," he gasps, bowing low. "The King requests your presence in the great square, immediately."

The once nearly-deserted streets of Taniquetil are nearly overflowing with people once more. All the same, Indis is able to cut a swift path through the throng, moving with an easy speed that leaves Amarië running in order to keep up with her. Amarië had to wince at the expression that Indis wore as she left the house: strained and worrying, no doubt wondering if something _else_ has happened to her family in this terrible darkness.

At the great square, the crowd is so thick that Amarië feels as though she is being crushed from all sides. The King and his wife and children stand upon the rostrum in the middle of the square, overlooking a cliff face and the mountains, facing east. Indis hastens up the steps of the rostrum towards her kin; Amarië attempts to lag behind, knowing it's not her place, but Indis makes an irritated noise in her throat, grabs Amarië's hand and pulls her along with her.

"Brother," Indis says to Ingwë, not even remotely out of breath (Amarië envies her that), "what is going on?" Her brow is furrowed with worry and confusion.

Ingwë turns to his sister, and his face is much like hers, but instead stamped with a mixture of trepidation and hope. "We were told to gather here, sister. You will see why very soon, I think."

Indis sighs and shakes her head, and stares out into the darkness to the east of the city, frowning slightly. Amarië does the same.

For the longest time, all she sees is the impenetrable dark that exists when Isil the Sheen has set or waned down to nothing. This is the dark of a stained and blighted world. This is the dark that not even the stars can lighten. The last thing Amarië wants to do is stare into it, for if fire does not have a soul, this darkness might, and when she stares into it, she feels as though it is looking back into her. It is a terrible, vulnerable feeling, all her secrets and dark thoughts exposed. She does not wish to expose herself to the dark.

Then, there comes a faint reddish light on the horizon.

There is a faint haze of red light on the eastern horizon, and Amarië stares at it, panicked. Is that the light of some great fire, spreading over the mountains towards Taniquetil? It must be truly massive to be visible from so far away; how long will it be before it reaches the city, devouring everything in its path?

But as Amarië stands there watching, transfixed in her horror, no fire comes roaring over the mountains towards her. Around the edge of the red light, the sky lightens, from impenetrable darkness, first to a rich, deep blue, then to mauve, and lavender, and pink and orange and gold. The stars around it seem to wink out of existence as the sky lightens.

An orb of fire rises slowly in the sky, so bright and brilliant that Amarië has to avert her gaze away from it. The darkness is pierced. It shatters. It breaks. It vanishes. The world is flooded with light.

-0-0-0-

The orb that lightens the sky is quickly dubbed Anar the Fire-golden. The time when it dominates the sky is designated day, and the time when Isil the Sheen dominates the sky is designated night. The days and nights are longer than they were in the days of the Trees.

Like Isil the Sheen, Anar the Fire-golden is an orb constructed by the remaining Noldor of Tirion, the Aulendur, and by the Great Smith. It has been imbued by the light of the final fiery fruit of Malinalda. As Isil the Sheen is wheeled through the sky by the Maia Tilion, Anar the Fire-golden is directed by the Maia Arien.

All is not as it was before the defilement of the Trees.

In the days of the Trees, the stars could be seen at all times, obscured as they were only by clouds. The golden light of Malinalda was only a sheer veil set over the firmament, just as Silpion was only a sheer silver veil over the sky full of stars. But the light of Isil the Sheen is not enough for the whole sky, and there is darkness around it. That the stars can be seen more clearly now than they could in the days of the Trees is small consolation. And Anar the Fire-Golden obscures them entirely. In contrast to Isil the Sheen, Her light is so violently bright that it turns the sky light blue and many colors at its rising and setting, and extinguishes the light of the stars entirely. But the world is no longer eternally dark, and in that Amarië can take some small consolation.

She stares out of the window at that pale blue sky, free of clouds today, and wonders.

Among the Vanyar, there are ritualistic dances and festivals mourning so much. The Marring of Arda, the loss of those Quendi lured away by the Enemy in the days of eternal starlight, the Sundering of the Quendi in the days of the journey. They are dances and festivals of wailing and moaning and screaming, of grotesque masks, of veils and shrouds and sackcloth. The festivals can not be called festive. The dancing can not really be called dancing, undulating and weaving about as they do, arms flailing in all directions, the mass twisted together. There is fasting, and there is blood drawn. Some beat and tear at their breasts. For others there is flagellation with whips and belts embedded with nails and shards of glass.

Amarië has participated in many of those festivals, bears the old, faded marks of flagellation upon her arms and legs and breast, though they are nearly gone. She wonders… Now that there is light in the world again, and the most intense grief for the loss of the Trees can be put away, will there be dances of remembrance done in their name? Will Quendi beat and tear at themselves, moan and wail and scream in the names of Silpion and Malinalda?

She wonders about those who never left Endóre. Those who only ever knew a world of starlight, who would not have known to notice when the Trees were extinguished, what did they think and feel when Isil the Sheen and Anar the Fire-Golden rose in the sky? Did they rejoice? Or did they quail in fear at some new, unwelcome light blistering the sky?

And the Exiles…

Amarië wonders about Elenwë, and little Itarillë. What they felt when finally there was an end to their wanderings in darkness. She imagines little Itarillë dancing about in the light of Anar the Fire-golden, and Elenwë lying back on green, newly-growing grass and basking in the warmth of its light.

She imagines Findaráto staring up at the sky, amazed at the sudden appearance of light to bring an end to darkness. Amarië imagines him trying to make sense of it, having no idea where either of the new lights have come from, and eventually, his quick mind will settle on some theory that, while plausible, is ultimately not quite on the mark.

But mostly, she just wishes that he was here with her to see them both rise for the first time. She wishes that he was standing beside her when the terrible dark was vanquished.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fëa—'soul' or 'spirit' in Quenya  
> Anar the Fire-golden—the name given to the Sun by the Vanyar, eventually adopted by the Noldor and the Teleri as 'Anar'  
> Aulendur—the name used first for those Noldor in the service of Aulë; later used for all those Noldor who did not involve themselves in the Rebellion and stayed in Aman; used to differentiate themselves from the Exiles


	4. IV.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we have Elemmire, because I just can't leave her alone.

**IV.**

The years pass, onto decades and centuries in what is called the First Age of the Sun. Aman enters into a state that can not be called bliss—how can there be bliss, after the horror of the Darkening and the shadow that remains? All one has to do is look out towards the green mound of Ezellohar and they will see the wizened, desiccated corpses of the Trees standing black and dreary against the sky. All one has to do is go into Tirion and see the nearly-empty streets, go into Alqualondë and see the way they shy away from strangers, hear them speak with contempt of the Noldor when once they called them friends.

No, the state Aman has entered can not be called bliss. There can be no bliss once there has been a fall. There scan be no bliss when the memory of what bliss truly was lingers so strongly on. But there is some measure of contentment again.

There were no children born during the Darkening. Whatever spell Kementári weaved to protect the plant and animal life of Aman had also this effect, and the effect of arresting the growth of any not fully-grown. Now, once again there are children being born to the Quendi. Amarië looks at them and sees Quendi born without the vigor of those who went before them. They reach adulthood more slowly than those born in the days of the Trees. They seem less fair, less strong, less gifted, though they still have plenty of all three. To them, the Trees, the Darkening, the flight of the Noldor and the Kinslaying at Alqualondë are matters of history, not living memory. The Exiles are figures of legend, not actual people.

Herself, Amarië's mother had her last child a year after the rising of Anar the Fire-golden. Anarórë she is called, Sun-Rise. Amarië finds herself having to correct her youngest sister's misconceptions on what went on before she was born, and increasingly, it leaves her snapping at the girl, furious and miserable at the memory of the lost days of bliss. Lindómë and Thorondis and Elvëandil, and even their children, can handle the misconceptions of the family's youngest member with better grace than Amarië can, but there is no amount of remonstration that can erase the irritability Amarië feels when Anarórë spouts inaccurate, off-base ideas about the Trees and the orbs wheeling about in the sky. _It is living memory for me. Why does it have to be history to you?_ Her youngest sister avoids her when she visits home.

But all in all, life has more or less picked up where it left off. There are even, just as Amarië suspected there might be, festivals dedicated to the two Trees, festivals and dances much after the fashion of those dedicated to the Marring of Arda and the Sundering of the Quendi. She has danced in a few, though Indis forbids her to partake in flagellation. Her mistress does not approve of it, no matter what the reasoning behind it. Oh well. Memory is flagellation enough.

Indis has at last put away her mourning clothes and, to the public, at least, put away her grief as well. She has even accepted her brother's invitation to court, and there Amarië is now, milling about listlessly in a garden under the stifling summer sky, naming the herbs and flowers.

_How I have missed this. The dry heat of Taniquetil, cooler than the damp humidity of Tirion at this time of year. The faces of the flowers and herbs that grow in the mountains, and the trees as well. Even if it is not Malinalda, at least the light of Anar the Fire-golden calls an end to darkness. At least the flowers grow again._

A streak of lightning splits the pewter sky. Thunder crashes over the roofs of the mountains. A strain of music sounds from a secluded corner, the notes of a lute and a strong, sweet, clear voice lifted in song.

" _Oh, she told me_

_Where the wind goes_

_When it passes o'er rock and ridge_

_And valley low, and mountain high…"_

Amarië follows the singing to its source, smiling a twitching smile, for she recognizes the voice of the singer, has come to know that voice well. In the shade of a small thorn-tree, there sits Elemmírë, strumming her fingers across the strings of her lute and singing, long legs folded beneath her, long, bare arms and shoulders dotted with freckles. She carries on her singing, head bowed over her lute and completely oblivious to Amarië's presence for quite some time.

Finally, Elemmírë's song draws to a close, and she becomes aware of the world around her again. She spies Amarië, bright blue eyes meeting ash gray. The minstrel smiles warmly. "Lady."

Elemmírë, a Vanyarin minstrel, has in the past decades become a favorite at the royal court. Though Amarië has had few dealings with her on a personal basis, she's found her personable, cheerful and friendly. The nís is of common birth, if well-off to start with and definitely benefitting from the favor she's found with the court—a bit more plain-spoken and frank than what Amarië is used to. Her singing is very lovely, though, and her playing, on the lute or the flute or the lyre, no less so. Amarië finds it strange that such a cheerful nís should be best known for the lament she wrote for the Two Trees, the Aldudénië.

"Do you practice here to draw the attention of others?" Amarië asks curiously, watching Elemmírë run her slim, nimble fingers over the strings of her lute.

The lutenist shakes her head, thick, frizzy curls, as golden as the light of Anar the Fire-golden flying all about her face. "Nay, Lady," she replies with a little laugh. "I've no need to sing for my supper."

 _No, I suppose you do not._ Another crack of thunder booms overhead, and Amarië draws her lavender shawl closer over her head. She steals a glance at Elemmírë's bare head, wondering how much it takes to get a shawl or a scarf over all of those curls.

"Do you know how to play the lute, Lady?" Elemmírë asks, smiling up at her. Amarië shakes her head mutely. "Well, would you like to learn?" the minstrel asks kindly. "You mistress would appreciate the sound of music in her house, I'm sure."

Amarië stares at her, taken aback. When before has she ever received an unsolicited offer of such a sort? She'd not even made some comment about wishing to learn. "Ah, no, but thank you for your offer. I've little aptitude for music." Or singing, for that matter. It was always rather awkward, in Tirion. Many of the Noldor assumed that since Amarië was a Vanya she could sing, play music and write poetry with the best of them. As it stands, she can do none of these things. Amarië's interests lie in sewing, herb lore and history, not music, song, nor poetry.

Elemmírë shakes her head, making a little tsk-ing sound in the back of her throat. "A pity. The world can never have enough music in it, in my opinion."

"Oh? So you would have every child born under the sky learn to sing and make music as babes?"

This earns Amarië a brief flash of white teeth in a smile. "Maybe. If you had been taught to sing when you were very small, or to play the lute, do you think you would have an "aptitude" for it now?"

Amarië's lips tug downwards in a rueful grimace. "My mother did try to teach me to sing when I was small," she admits, sitting down on a stone bench near where Elemmírë has set up shop, smoothing down her skirt. "I was horrible at it. Mother didn't have to wait long for consolation, though; the first of my sisters can sing as sweetly as any songbird. Mother even named her Lindómë."

Elemmírë snorts indelicately. "No pressure upon you, then."

Amarië laughs. "No, none at all." It had so infuriated her at the time, when her mother named her second-born 'Sweet-voiced.' Back in the days when she had still cared about such things and still struggled to remember the words in songs and sing everything in tune, it had infuriated her, left her utterly green with envy that sweet little Lindómë could do everything perfectly. Where Amarië struggled to carry a tune from start to finish, Lindómë could sing from dawn to dusk without tiring. It took years, and it took discovering where her talents truly lied, for Amarië to overcome that envy.

"And if…" Amarië pauses, smiling faintly down at the ground "…and if you think that my mistress's house could do with music, I would suggest that you fill it up with song yourself."

"Hmm." Elemmírë brushes her hair back from her face—a losing battle; more just springs down in front of it. She wears a faint smile of her own. "Perhaps I will."

For a few minutes, maybe a quarter of an hour, Amarië sits on the bench, and listens to Elemmírë play her lute, sliding her fingers over the strings. Eventually, however, Amarië hears Indis calling her name from elsewhere in the garden, and hastens to meet her.

"Lady? Lady!"

Halfway down the path, Amarië stops and sees Elemmírë rushing to catch up with her. The minstrel's brow is furrowed as she holds something out to her. "You dropped this," Elemmírë says breathlessly, opening her hand to reveal a silver ring.

Amarië's heart barely beats as she takes the rings back from Elemmírë and nods her thanks to her. She doesn't head on to Indis. She doesn't slide the ring back onto her finger. She holds it in her open palm, staring at it.

With the exception of the youngest, all of her sisters have wed, and had children. Thorondis's oldest is expecting a child of her own sometime next spring. Even Anarórë is seeing some young nér, and Lindómë suspects that there will be an announcement of a betrothal soon. Her sisters born before the Darkening have wed, and had children. And she is yet unmarried, childless, waiting upon her mistress still.

_And how long has it been since I last thought of him? How long? How long since I imagined my beloved with me, the light in his golden hair, light shining out of his gray eyes? How long since I imagined my hand in his?_

_How often does he think of me, on the other side of the sea, if he even yet lives? Does he think of me often, or has he forgotten me in head and heart with the passage of years? Absence makes the heart grow fonder, but eventually it makes the heart forget, and we have been apart longer than we have been together._

_So, I wonder… How much of my memory is truth, and how much of it is embellishment. I hold images of him still in my head. How much of that is real? How much of it is just the way I want to remember it?_

Amarië slides the ring back over her finger. It is cold and heavy. She squeezes her eyes shut, feels them sting and prickle and burn. _What is memory? Truth or lies? And what is it that I remain here, when he is gone? What is that for?_ A dull, hollow pain pierces her breast. Perhaps something to do with her heart.


	5. V.

**V.**

Amarië has not visited her family at her parents' house often since she entered Indis's service. When Finwë was alive and they lived in Tirion still, there was simply no opportunity. Tirion and Taniquetil are so far away from one another that for Amarië to visit her parents if Indis herself was not visiting Taniquetil simply wasn't feasible. And once they were back in Taniquetil, during the Darkening and ever afterwards, Amarië told herself that Indis needed her too much for her to ask leave to visit her parents for any length of time.

She was present for Anarórë's birth, present for the betrothals and weddings, some—though not many—of the coming of age celebrations in her family. She came as many times as was considered polite, and stayed away otherwise. There are many reasons why Amarië has avoided family gatherings. There's Anarórë and the irritation Amarië felt with her. There is her father's kin, who have never quite treated her the same way after she was betrothed to a Noldo, moreover an Exile, and that she has not repudiated him; Amarië finds herself far more sensitive to criticism of that sort than she used to be. And maybe the image in her head of all her sisters married with children of their own, while she remains unwed, has had something to do with it too.

Some things don't change, Amarië finds, and her parents' and maternal grandparents' house is one of them. As she walks through the sunlit halls, picks her path through the potted plants lining the walls, the overflowing linen basket sitting outside of her parents' bedchamber, the shards of broken pottery sitting in the corners near the door to the back garden. She walks through these halls and remembers her childhood, may as well be a child again. Nothing here has changed. Nothing ever changes here. Amarië almost expects to hear her mother scolding her for hiding in the scullery during a music lesson.

The back garden is just as she remembers it, too, even if the light that falls over the trees and plants is the light of Anar the Fire-golden, and not Malinalda. There's still the little willow tree, with its long, limp branches brushing against the surface of the pond. Amarië stares into the water and sees the iridescent scales of the fish within wink in the sunlight. In the air is the strong, bitter-sweet commingled perfume of roses, hyssop and rosemary. The bright red and white petals of the asters in one flowerbed gleam wetly in the sunlight.

And there he is, sitting on the same bench as always, staring into nothing.

Niron is the father of Amarië's mother, her maternal grandfather. He has hair the same wheat-colored shade as Amarië's, and is one of the few members of her family she has consistently gotten along with over the centuries. Taciturn and rather gruff he is, except when drawn into storytelling—eloquent by his own standards, voice softening out to sonorousness. Since earliest childhood, Amarië has looked at him and seen someone who does not, will not, can not fit into the polite society of Taniquetil. Too rough, too close to the earth, and not nearly reverent enough of the Valar and of Ilúvatar. A child of the Lake, Niron remains.

"Vanisailë," he greets her as she sits down at his side, calling her by her mother-name as he always does. Niron does not look at her as he speaks, instead staring into the depths of a juniper tree. "You have not come to this place often, since your return to Elerrína."

"…No, Grandfather. I have not."

This place is a trap, for her memories and for herself.

"Your grandmother sleeps often, still. Your mother does as well, if you were curious." There is no malice intended by his words, though you would have to know him well, to be able to see that, for Niron's flat, gruff voice and his continued refusal to make eye contact could certainly suggest otherwise.

Amarië nods. "I'm not surprised Anarórë's birth tired Mother out, and I've never known Grandmother not to be tired."

This place isn't the only one that's a trap. Indis's house feels the same. So does the royal court. So does all of Taniquetil. Tirion, Amarië is sure, would be just another one as well. A trap for her memories, a trap for herself, dragging her in, dragging her under and keeping her there. Forcing her to relive the past constantly, and all the while, time siphons away the freshness of her memories until Amarië isn't sure half of the time what she's supposed to be reliving. She'll be walking down a corridor and expect to meet someone at the other end, but that person isn't there, and she's not sure who she was expecting. Findaráto? Elenwë? Princess Findis? Her mother?

It needs to stop, it really does.

Amarië reaches out and tucks her hand into her grandfather's scarred, callused palm. When she was little, the scars there, the ones on his arms and chest, and the one near his mouth that pulls when he smiles fascinated her. No one else that she knew had such scars, apart from Rácinë her grandmother, and Rácinë does not showcase her scars the way Niron does. Now, as a grown nís who can connect history and her grandfather's place in it, Niron's scars still fascinate Amarië, but they sadden her as well. Here they are, the relics of a hard life in a savage time. "I didn't come here to talk to Mother or Grandmother, though. I came to talk to you."

At last, Niron turns his gray eyes on her, one eyebrow raised. "Oh? And what do you wish to speak with me about, Vanisailë?"

"I wanted you to tell me about how the Quendi lived in Endóre before the Journey."

He lets out a barking laugh. "Is this not what you pestered me about constantly as a little girl?" And yet he loved to tell the stories as much as Amarië loved to hear them. "Or have they all poured out of your pretty head?"

Amarië shakes her head. "I want you to tell me the stories, Grandfather. The ones you _didn't_ tell me when I was a little girl," she adds determinedly.

As quick as a flash, Niron's whole demeanor changes. He searches her face intently, trying to discern some hint of her motives—Amarië doesn't know why he bothers at such scrutiny; _she_ feels as though her motives are clear on her face. A gently breeze dips down over the garden walls, playing with the ends of his short, choppily-cut hair.

Finally, Niron nods, curling his fingers over the back of Amarië's hand. "Alright," he mutters. "You're probably the only person who's ever actually come to me _wanting_ to know those sorts of stories. But one question, Vanisailë: why not consult the histories, if you wish to know of life beside the Lake?"

Amarië smiles. "Because all of the histories concerning Cuiviénen and the Great Journey were written by Quendi born here in Aman. You, on the other hand, were actually born there."

This gets another laugh out of Niron, a gentler one. "You always knew how to wheedle stories out of me, child." The laughter dies out of his face; shadows gather behind his eyes. "We were afraid of the dark," he says quietly, staring slightly above her eyes. "We feared what moved in the darkness beyond our fires and the doors of our simple homes."

Fear of the dark featured in many of the stories Niron told his granddaughters (mostly Amarië and Thorondis) as little girls. To hear him say as much now does not surprise Amarië, but she nods, and says nothing, hoping perhaps to glean fresh knowledge from his recollections. Besides, the distant, pallid face he shows forestalls any attempt at interruption.

"We were afraid of the dark. There were beasts that lurked beyond what our eyes could see, wolves and bears and such. And more than that. The Hunter in the Dark's creatures, come to lure us away. We would see nothing, hear nothing," he whispers, shoulders slumping. His eyes are shadowed and glazed. "And then, these creatures would come out of the darkness, melt out of the shadows. In form, they were like wolves, or bears, or great cats. But they were as black as night, and they had great, red, burning eyes. It's how I got this." He points to the scar on his face. "One of them struck a blow across my face, but this was the only claw mark that scarred. From time to time, we were able to drive them away, but they would catch Quendi of our number, and those they dragged away, we never saw again." Niron shuts his eyes tight, old, ancient pain and fear twisting at his jaw. "I can only pray that they were killed, for the alternative…

"But then, the Hunter's creatures did not always come as these fell, spectral beasts. At times, they would come in the form of pale wraiths, filled with some fey light, bearing the likeness of lost loved ones. They would stand at the edge of our camp and call to those among our number who would recognize the voice. _Come to me,_ they would say. _I am not lost. Come to me. Follow me. Why will you not come; do you not recognize me?_ They would cry out in plaintive voices and those whose names they spoke had to be restrained from running after them. No one who followed these wraiths ever returned. And sometimes, they would come in the form of these twisted creatures, like Quendi in that they walked upright, and spoke. But they were diseased, grotesque. They were what today we call Orcs. The special creations of the Hunter in the Dark. They came, seeking any who strayed away from our camp. They picked off stragglers, harried messengers, sometimes were even so bold as to lurk at the edges of our camps. Princess Indis, your mistress, was the only one of the Minyar who ran fast enough to evade them. Thus, she became our messenger and emissary to the camps of the Tatyar and the Nelyar."

Amarië stares at Niron, surprised. She had never known this of Indis. Yes, she knew that Indis was a runner in the days before her marriage to Finwë, and she knew that Indis was one of those who made the Journey from Cuiviénen to Aman, but she had never known that Indis was Imin and Iminyë's messenger to the other camps of the Quendi along the shoreline of Cuiviénen.

"The Orcs came with crude weapons, swords and spears and knives. At first, we would set up look-outs at the edge of our camps, to try and see if danger was coming. I remember, there was this boy of the Nelyar who could spy danger even in the densest of darkness, where anyone else would have seen naught but shadow. There were some like him, mostly among the Nelyar and the Tatyar. They were strange people. They were among those who stayed behind and became known as the Avari. They did not fear the darkness as much as the rest of us did, having such sharp eyes.

"But eventually, setting up sharp-eyed look-outs wasn't enough."

"Is that when the Quendi first began making weapons?" Amarië asks quietly, staring at him with wide eyes.

There is a sword that sits leaned up against the wall in her grandparents' bedchamber. It's a crude thing, nothing like the weapons forged by the Noldor in the tense years leading up to the Darkening. A crude, iron short-sword, with a scored, battered blade and a thick, blocky cross-guard.

Niron nods. "At first, we would steal weapons left behind by the Orcs when we drove them off with torches. But it wasn't enough. I suppose it will come as no surprise to you that it was one of the Tatyar who first discovered the secret to the forging of weapons. He taught many among his own people, among the Nelyar. A few of the Minyar learned, but not many of us." Amarië grimaces. There are smiths among her people, but the occupation is not held in high regard amongst the Vanyar, and thus, neither are smiths of any sort. Smith-craft simply is not highly valued.

"We used these weapons, swords and spears and knives, to drive off the orcs and the beasts that prowled in the darkness, hoping to catch a Quendë unawares. In retribution, they did what they could to destroy the fruits and plants that we fed on, and thus we also developed hunting tools, the bow and arrow, and traps so that we might catch animals and not starve. And at times…" Niron swallows; he clenches Amarië's hand so tightly that her fingers start to go numb. "…At times, we used them on each other."

_What?!_

He sees her horrified face and shakes his head vigorously. "Oh, no, Vanisailë, not like that," he says hurriedly. "Never like that. Even in the worst of our starvation we never fed upon each other. The very idea repelled us. But… But those weapons we made, we did use them on each other. Not often. And we never killed. There would come times when two Quendi would have some dispute, over food or resources, or insults that were supposed to have been passed. Iminyë, she would mediate between us as best she could, but sometimes that simply wasn't enough.

"It was Imin, before he was taken, who first decided on having the offended parties engage in a duel." Amarië stares at him, curiosity piqued; she has heard of no such thing in the histories. "If two Quendi had a dispute that could not be settled by peaceful mediation, they were to settle their dispute by prowess in arms. This they would do in the presence of twelve others, including Imin and Iminyë before they were taken; after they were taken, it was in the presence of Ingwë and Indis. The duel was not to be to the death; it was fought until one of the combatants fell unconscious or yielded to their opponent. Whoever won the duel won the dispute, and they were not to argue on it anymore. The Tatyar and the Nelyar quickly adopted this system as well."

"That… seems reasonable," Amarië admits reluctantly. As barbaric as the idea of 'trial by combat' in any sense sounds to her, in the absence of a well-developed law system she supposes she should just be glad that the Minyar (and the other Quendi) had some standardized system of settling disputes that prevented them from killing each other.

Niron nods, pursing his lips. "So we thought at the time. But once we arrived in Aman, the Valar had us destroy all of our weapons, save that which we used for hunting. They were horrified at our customs. We were forbidden from using weapons on each other, and told that we would never again have need for swords or knives in our own defense."

"But Grandfather, you still have your sword."

"Yes." Niron laughs a rather hiccupy laugh. "Yes, I do. I am not the only one. But no one has come for my sword, and I doubt that anyone will. But…" That all-too-familiar shadow falls over his face and behind his eyes. "As time went on, and we became accustomed to the bliss of Aman, we came to remember our days in Endóre sick at heart and horrified at the way we used to live. The memories of life that once we had accepted as normal became dark and twisted." He draws a long, shuddering breath. "Vanisailë… Among the Noldor, none of those who made the Journey from Endóre followed Fëanáro into Exile. None of those who once called themselves Tatyar, and then Ñgolodō, would follow Fëanáro, or raise arms against the Falmari. If ever again you go among the Aulendur, you might ask them why that is.

"Now…" He scuffs at the ground with his foot, at last relaxing his grip on Amarië's hand. Her fingers tingle and burn as the blood rushes back into them. "Now, child, if you wish to hear more about those days, I would request that you ask me about something else."

Amarië is silent.

She knows what she wants to ask him about. It's exactly that which she came here looking for him, wishing to hear him say. All of this about the advent of weaponry and smith-craft has been interesting, has actually clarified a great deal of the questions Amarië used to have about life besides the Lake, but for all that this has been a stimulating conversation for the sake of edification, it's not what she came here for.

Amarië came here for something very specific. She has searched for it in all of the histories, all those she has access to, looking for it, and has found nothing. Personally, Amarië has begun to suspect that the loremasters responsible for the histories of the Awakening and Cuiviénen have left it out on purpose. She suspects that they do not wish for anyone to know those stories. The idea that it did not exist is, while not inconceivable, highly unlikely in her opinion. But Niron can say for sure.

_But can I ask him? I know what I wish to glean from this conversation. If I do not hear what I have sought, what will I do? What can I do?_

_I do not wish to be told that I must remain like this until the end of my days._

"I…" She hesitates. _Courage. Have courage. Find your nerve, and ask._ "…I did want you to tell me about marriage, before the Quendi made the Journey to Aman."

Somehow, Amarië doesn't think that this was quite the question Niron was expecting to receive from her. A sheen of surprise glazes his gray eyes. "Can you be a bit more specific?"

"I… I wanted to know…" Now it is Amarië who squeezes her grandfather's fingers tightly, instead of the other way around. "I wanted to know if the Quendi ever remarried, when they lived by the shores of Cuiviénen."

"Yes, we did."

Amarië stares at him, and Niron's lip twitches. Not quite a smile, but close enough. "No, I don't suppose you ever heard _that_ in any of the histories." Amarië blushes despite herself and he laughs. "I see that you didn't. The Valar made such a fuss when Princess Indis and Finwë wished to wed, but I do not think that they understand us as well as they claim to. Don't give me that look, Vanisailë; I am not the only one with such thoughts in mind. Indis and Finwë were invoking an old right that the Quendi once had, before we came to live here.

"Of course, there were those who separated while they were both still alive. Marriage was not considered a contract to last for the rest of both the party's lives. If it was discovered that two Quendi simply could not live together as a married couple, they went their separate ways. It is as simple as that." Frankly, Amarië doesn't think much of _that_ , but refrains from saying so. Niron does not mind interruptions all that much, but if she shows some sign of a closed mind, he might refuse to say anything more to her. "It seemed nothing short of cruel to force two people to live with one another, after it had become so clear that they co-exist as a married couple.

"And if our spouse died, by starvation or cold or by the machinations of the Hunter in the Dark, we might, if we so wished and there was one we came to love as we had loved our lost spouse, married again." Niron scratches at his cheek. "No, we did not cleave to one spouse for all eternity as we do here. We did not understand what we do now of death. We did not know then that there was some chance that we would eventually see our dead husbands or wives or lovers again. They seemed lost to us for all eternity."

"But now, Lord Mandos has begun letting the dead out of the Houses of the Dead," Amarië points out, brow furrowed. "What happens when these people are let out?" She knows the condition that the Valar exacted in exchange for their consent to Indis and Finwë's marriage—that Míriel Þerindë would never again walk among the living. She knows that when Finwë died, Þerindë was ready to leave the Houses of the Dead, and that the Valar would only allow her to leave if now _Finwë_ would agree to dwell there for all eternity, until the breaking of the world, and never again walk among the living. The Valar… They are kind, beneficent. But they can be cruel. Amarië knows that.

Niron sighs, looking down. "Hmm. Well, I suppose you could say that they are living quietly."

"You are joking!" Amarië exclaims.

He laughs. "No, Vanisailë, I am not." Mirth glimmers in his eyes as he looks at her. "Oh, child, you are so very sheltered. I know some of those who live thus now. Of course, not everyone can live with such an arrangement; I imagine it must be very tense indeed, to have a married couple living together, with the person that one of them was once married to, and in the eyes of the Valar and many of our own people, still married to. You've come to love someone else, but you used to love them, and perhaps you still do. No, not everyone can live with that."

"But the Valar…"

"The Valar say nothing. They do not know, or do not wish to know. Or perhaps they do know and simply allow us to hash this out amongst ourselves, so long as we do so discreetly. My _point,_ Vanisailë, is that we did not sit in desolation forever. We learned to live with our grief, and mastered it. Do you understand?"

Amarië nods. Yes, she does. She really does, and this… "Thank you, Grandfather," she says, quiet, heartfelt. She leans over to kiss his cheek, and leaves.

This place is not for her, too many memories here. She must go. But she is glad to have heard his words, before she goes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Elerrína—'Crowned with stars'; another name for Taniquetil, one I envision as being one of its older names  
> Ñgolodō—a Primitive Quendian intermediate form of Noldor, derived from the stem ngol 'knowledge, wisdom, lore'; seen in 'Quendi and Eldar' in The War of the Jewels, HoME, Volume XI  
> Falmari—those among the Teleri who completed the journey to Aman; the name is derived from the Quenya falma, '[crested] wave.'


	6. VI.

**VI.**

The Vanyar are typically the very last to get any news of Endóre. Perhaps fitting, since they were at the first so very eager to leave.

At last, the Houses of the Dead begin to release those who died in Endóre. Moriquendi, Quendi who were once of the Teleri and now come out amongst Aman speaking strange tongues, looking at their surroundings with wonder. Avari of the Tatyar and Nelyar who did not wish to be here to start with. Exiles, whom Lord Mandos has deemed worthy of living again. The dead return to the Undying Lands, and bring with them news, such as they have it, of Beleriand in Endóre, and what goes on there.

The Avari take to the countryside and speak to few. The Moriquendi, being almost entirely of Telerin stock, travel to Alqualondë and Tol Eressëa, looking for long-lost loved ones, family and friends that they were separated from during the Journey from Cuiviénen. To Tirion go the Exiles (though there are far fewer of them roaming about than there are Moriquendi); those who left family behind live with them, and those whose families are either still in Beleriand or still residing in the Houses of the Dead live alone. So the Teleri and the Noldor receive news of Beleriand long before the Vanyar do.

But eventually, the Moriquendi want to see more of Aman, they make their way across the continent, and in their journeying they come to see the city of Taniquetil on the slopes of the of the mountain of the same name, that which they call Amon Uilos. Eventually, there are those amongst the Exiles who find that the Aulendur do not want them in their city, that they are not welcome among their people. Alqualondë and Tol Eressëa are no places for them—even those among the Exiles who never killed other Quendi are considered Kinslayers by the Teleri—so they go to Taniquetil. The Exiles have hardly any better a time of it here, but at the very least the rebellion did not leave bad blood between the Noldor and the Vanyar.

So, slowly, very slowly, news makes its way to Taniquetil, and the Vanyar learn of the fates of their sundered kin across the sea.

And just as slowly, news comes to Amarië.

But come it does.

He is dead.

Findaráto Ingoldo, son of Arafinwë and Eärwen, is dead.

She hears him called by an odd name, the tongue of the Moriquendi, called Sindarin. They call him Finrod Felagund and name him a great King in Beleriand, King of a realm that has now fallen to the Enemy. Findaráto was slain, they say, aiding a Sindarin princess and a mortal Man in their quest to steal a Silmaril from the Enemy so that they might wed.

It hardly matters. No, the details do not matter, except that he is dead, and that he suffered horribly before he died.

Amarië hears the news in the street, catching by chance the conversation of a couple of Moriquendi and a few of the Vanyar. She hears it as though she was never anything to him at all, as though he and she were strangers and she does not wear the ring he gave her. She hears the news, and the already frigid winter day goes deathly cold. She hears them talk, and it's like something in her cracked. Suddenly, it doesn't matter that she's out here running errands for Indis. Amarië turns on her heel and walks numbly home, her heart in her throat, breath barely passing her lips. Indis looks up in surprise to see her back so soon, surprise turning to shock at the look on her handmaiden's face, and Amarië does not hear the words she cries out after her as Amarië's retreats to her bedchamber, and locks herself in.

At least… At least it's finally over.

That treacherous thought comes to her in solitude, in between tears, and is aired in damning silence. At least she's no longer left wondering what has become of him in strange lands, living on forever in darkness and in doubt. She has names to put to the places that he's been, the place that he lived and made his own.

Amarië tries to imagine Findaráto ruling a kingdom of his own. She smiles bitterly through her tears. _He always said that he felt lucky that there was almost no chance that he would ever have to rule the Noldor, or anything. Findaráto did not want to be King of anything; he said that the idea of so much responsibility on his head was terrifying. Like the first-born sons of his uncles, he received training to succeed Finwë if for some reason he died, but Findaráto still never seriously entertained the idea that he would rule a kingdom of his own._

_I remember. "That is good, I said, for I do not wish to be Queen of anything. I just wish to be your wife."_

_The face he showed…_

_What did his face look like?_

_What did it look like?_

_Why am I still doing this?_

The room is freezing. Amarië realizes that first, when she shakes herself out of her memories. The room is freezing, and the tear tracks on her face aren't frozen, but they may as well be. She hoists herself off of her bed to light a fire in the grate. Her muscles ache as though she's been running for a millennium, and she huddles by the fireplace and holds her hands out to catch the warmth of the popping flames.

 _Didn't I cry more when I heard that Elenwë had died?_ she asks the tears sliding slowly down her face, still. _Didn't I cry more, and moaned and wailed when I learned that she had died, learned of her cruel death and the cruel betrayal that had wrought it? Didn't I cry more when I learned that her daughter was now a motherless child?_

_Oh, my love, it is cruel, but you bought this fate for yourself._

_And what is the face you showed me as you left? I find I can no longer remember._

It is over. At long last, it is over. Amarië knows what has become of he whom she loved, he whom she does love. The idea of his painful death is bitter, but it is better than staring out towards the east and knowing nothing. It is better than not knowing.

And what has Findaráto become to her, anyways? When Amarië thinks of him he rarely seems real anymore. Memory and desire mix together, and she can't say where memory ends and daydreams begin. He is… The past, really. That's what he is. The past. That's what he has become to her, another trap for her memories and herself, but one that moves with her.

One day, maybe soon, maybe not, maybe not ever, Findaráto will be released from the Houses of the Dead. Amarië can not say how long that will be, or how much more will have changed by then. But she wants to be able to have eyes to see it, and… Amarië squeezes her eyes shut, blinking away any last tears. Not like this.

_I can't live like this._

_But…_

_There is one image I will keep._

-0-0-0-

Amarië can not say if Indis has discovered why she came home in such a state, but whatever the reason, Indis does not call on her service any more that day, and lets her be instead. She's probably guessed, even if she doesn't know. A servant comes by in the evening, knocking on her door and asking if she wishes to take supper, but Amarië sends her away. She isn't hungry.

The next morning, however, Amarië returns to her duties as though nothing has happened. She does awaken feeling sore and tired, the edges of her eyes burning, her throat raw. However, Amarië also wakes feeling far more wakeful and alert than she has in a very long time. It's odd, but she had never really realized how tired she had been before until this morning.

And was Anar the Fire-golden's light so bright before? Is it simply the light reflecting off of the snow, or is she really just now noticing how bright the light can be?

It does not matter. Amarië joins Indis in the dining room for breakfast as they always start their days. "Please pardon my lateness, Highness," she says with a curtsey as she enters the room, and finds Indis already waiting there with her plate in front of her. "I overslept."

Indis gives her a brow-furrowed, worried look, pale eyes full of sympathy. "Not at all, Amarië. If you wish, I will call the kitchen maid to bring you some breakfast. After you would not eat last evening, I was not sure if you would have any appetite this morning."

Truth be told, Amarië is rather hungry, and she smiles gratefully at the offer. "Thank you, Highness. I would like that."

As Amarië's breakfast is called for, Indis puts away her eating utensils and laces her hands together. Amarië knows her mistress's customs, and one of them is that she will not eat if those sitting with her at a table do not have food in front of them. It doesn't matter if that someone is one of her attendants.

"Amarië…"

She looks up and sees Indis's gaze fixed on her left hand, an inscrutable look on her face. "You're not wearing your betrothal ring," Indis says quietly.

Amarië shakes her head and smiles. "No, I am not."

There really is no point in it, anymore. She is not going to turn the corner and see Findaráto standing at the end of the hall, waiting for her with a smile on his face. Her last shackle, she casts away. And this is the one image she will keep, above the fear and uncertainty, or the distortions of time: the look in his eyes, his beloved face, the day they were betrothed, before they were parted, by time, and distance, and death.


End file.
